Not About Top Chef!

So, one of the things I do for fun sometimes is read show recaps over at Television without Pity, usually of shows I either have watched, or watched but then gave up on. For some reason, I'm currently working my way through the recaps of America's Next Top Model. Yesterday, for a little while, I had to stop reading because I was really irritated about body image issues.

It's season ("cycle", whatever) 3, and Toccara, who is a size 12, is doing pretty well. Until they get to the fashion designers, who of course are just aghast, aghast that this extremely fat cow who might even be, if you can imagine, a size fourteen, is trying to wear any of their clothes.

No, really. If anything, I'm understating the reported derision, and Potes is probably understating the actual depicted derision.

Now I'm sure some of you out there are the type who would think that a size 12 or 14 is really disgustingly fat. You can leave now. In fact, I'm fine with you never coming back. The rest of you are probably going, "But... isn't that like the average size of women in this country?"

Why yes. Yes, it is. And even if you buy into the hype that this country is full of nothing but fatties... if that's the case... why are designers only making clothes for extremely thin people???

It really irks me that the average size in this country is somehow considered plus size and that people design around the lower end of sizes exclusively. It irks me even more that even designers I respect can't make a garment that someone of an average size can wear.

It's kinda like the "Ordinary Woman" challenge from Project Runway 3 all over again, only with even meaner people.

I mean, look, I appreciate that there are more challenges designing for someone whose body proportions are different from what you normally work with. Obviously if you're used to working with a tall, willowy figure, doing a short, pear-like figure is going to mean making some changes. But, you know, even most of the skinny women I know are a) a lot shorter than models and b) tend to be at least a little meatier than models. And most of the women I know are larger. (The one person I do know of model-thin proportions? She has a hard time finding clothes that fit well, too. Weird, huh?)

I've seen pictures of Toccara. She's gorgeous. She does have very large breasts and slightly large thighs, but she's not what I would call "fat". I bet if she had her body fat measured, she'd be well within what's considered healthy. (I don't believe in BMI, so don't care what hers is.) I'd bet from the poses she can hold she's in better shape than most of the people watching the show, too (and I'd like to see you run up several flights of stairs).

So... all this leads me to wonder: why the hell is America's Next Top Model supposed to be so tall and skinny anyhow?

And what do we get out of it? Clothes that fit no one but a small percentage of the population. Models who are sometimes literally starving themselves to death. Ones with visible, countable ribs and vertebrae, who think that a head of lettuce is a meal, who worry about gaining two pounds... who are forcing themselves to fit a specific mold that most of them don't belong in.

And bitchy designers and media people who have managed to convince themselves that a normal, average woman is disgustingly fat... and that "fat" automatically means "not pretty".

I'd like to think that the awareness of the propensity towards eating disorders in models and those who see them as the ultimate goal of beauty is going to mean that when I get to later seasons of the show this won't come up as much. But I'm not holding my breath. Because 14 is still plus-size. Because even Tim Gunn, who I usually respect, can call a tall, skinny model "fat" because the other girls are skinniER. Because we still use the ridiculous BMI method of determining acceptable sizes, instead of the much saner body fat percentage that takes into account things like bone structure and muscle density. And because people are hypocrites, because a lot of the people who judge these women fat aren't exactly models themselves. I'd like to think this will change, but mostly, I've given up.